Rochester has an annoying habit of destroying its own history, in the name of “progress.”

Much ado has been made over razing Midtown Mall to make the site a focal point for downtown redevelopment. Only the continued blunders of Citygov in that respect haven’t accomplished quite what they wanted…or quite put it over on Rochester’s residents.

Midtown Mall was supposed to become the site of the new headquarters of the now-defunct Paetec Company, featuring a majestic and grandiose 38 story building that was to dwarf everything within miles of downtown. It never happened for several reasons, one of which was that Citygov’s corporate counsel never bothered to get a written contract with Arunas Chesonis, the former owner of the former Paetec. Citygov committed Rochester to tearing down Midtown Mall for Paetec, with nothing more than a shady “gentlemen’s agreement” from Paetec.

THAT corporate counsel is currently mayor of Rochester.

Rochester has seen the demise of truly historic buildings downtown.

Claude Bragdon’s masterpiece, the railway station on Central Avenue, fell before the wrecker’s ball ( in two stages ) during the 1960s. It was replaced by a “temporary” tacky lean-to that exists there to this day.

The old RKO Palace, an ornate tribute to vaudeville, burlesque and motion pictures was also demolished at the same time. The site was supposed to become a focal point for downtown redevelopment with shops, offices, restaurants and apartments.

But as the song goes, “They paved a paradise and put up a parking lot.”

The site remains a parking lot.

The façade of the old “Cooke Opera House” on South Avenue, built in the 1820s, mysteriously went up in flames in the early 1970s. It was in the process of getting national landmark status, which might have impeded developers from “rejuvenating” the area.

In its place we now have the Rochester Convention Center, which is hardly an example of monumental architecture, although it has nice views of the Genesee River…for paying guests.

Yet, there was a public outrage when it came to demolishing Midtown Mall. Mostly from suburbanites who hadn’t visited downtown in years.

Major tenants, including Wegmans, had moved out of it over the years.

Private developers were uninterested in purchasing it, because the cost to renovate it was high ( given all of the asbestos that was present in the building ). In fact, it was cheaper to demolish it and clean up the debris than it would have been to renovate it.

And the façade of Midtown Mall was downright ugly, resembling “Soviet Realism.” Especially when once considers the truly majestic architecture of the Sibley Building, just across Main Street!

The biggest complaint was that Rochester was destroying an “historic” building ( built in the early 1960s ): the first “urban mall” in America.

Only Midtown Mall was no such thing.

An interior sketch of Rochester's FIRST urban mall, the Reynolds Arcade!

Rochester’s first “urban mall” was the Reynolds Arcade, at the Four Corners west of the Genesee River.

The Reynolds Arcade was built in 1828, and was considered to be the most impressive building west of Albany. Expanding numerous times in its history, it featured shops, offices, curving staircases and an atrium.

The old Reynolds Arcade was modernized in 1932, and it still has an impressive interior, though the façade underwent the perils of “progress.” And its location still features other buildings of truly historic nature at the Four Corners that have been updated to suit modern purposes and needs, all of which predate Midtown Mall.

Smaller, separate buildings were demolished to make way for Midtown Mall in the early 1960s. Smaller, separate buildings are part of Citygov’s “vision” with which to replace Midtown Mall to create their “Potemkin Village.”

Rochester’s downtown “redevelopment” has come full circle in less than two generations.

There will be seats coming up for re-election on our hopelessly inept School Board, whose antics ( coupled with those of the Superintendent of Schools that they hired ) have produced one of the worst school systems in New York State…if not the worst. People complain about that, but the incumbents have nothing to fear: they know that the same people will be too lazy to run and support alternative candidates, so the status quo on the School Board will remain unchanged.

The same holds true for the five city council seats at large that are coming up for re-election. The incumbents have nothing to fear but their own records of failure, which voters always seem to forget the minute they walk into their polling places. Of course, since it is an election year, the various neighborhood and community groups can expect the incumbents to show up at their meetings, rarely, if ever, to see them again once they have been re-elected.

Since Rochester is a one-party town, monopolized by the Democrats, any serious threats to the incumbents seeking re-election will be coming from within the Democratic Party. This will require a primary election, since there are always a surfeit of Democrats seeking political office. And when the smoke clears, the slate of candidates looks pretty much like it did before.

The small third parties don’t cut much political ice in Rochester, except perhaps to endorse Democratic candidates. The Monroe County GOP has long since abandoned Rochester, secure in its control of the county government. For concerned city Republicans seeking political office in Rochester, well, they will have to do it on their own with no real support from the county GOP.

In short, there should be no real surprises come November 2013.

Of course, the office of the mayor comes up for election this year. And Rochester’s current mayor will undoubtedly run again.

This accounts for the Democrats’ recent attempts to build up the image of the current mayor, to create a “cult of personality” about him, in line with the “cult of personality” the county GOP has built up around County Executive Maggie Brooks. Since the current mayor has been in office for less than two years, and his “successes” are dubious at best, such a cult doesn’t seem merited.

But, it might be seen as necessary, since the current mayor got less than fifty percent of the vote during the so-called “special election” in 2011!

This explains why Citygov is hell-bent to continue its “vision” ( which is probably a hallucination ) to re-invent downtown Rochester: it will provide them with a platform to run their re-election campaigns. Never mind that any plans for downtown redevelopment envisioned by Citygov over the last generation have been stunning failures.

The current “vision” of Citygov is to redevelop the hole left by demolishing Midtown Mall ( the result of the last failed “vision” by the current lieutenant governor when he was mayor of Rochester ) and create a “Potemkin Village” on the site and its environs. While it sounds good ( and so many other failures to reinvent downtown sounded good, too, at first ), the end result seems to create an elitist enclave in the heart of the City of Rochester, while the poorest of Rochester’s four quadrants ( the Northeast district ) is less than a mile away!

However, Citygov is encouraging “the people” to take part in the discussions about downtown’s re-creation. What real effect, if any, has yet to be seen.

Recently, some representatives of Citygov met with the Maplewood Neighborhood Association’s Board of Directors. The meeting was ostensibly to discuss how to improve the quality of life in Maplewood, and how to address the problems of increasing incidents of crime, youth violence and slumlords. However, it was strongly suggested that the neighborhood leaders involve themselves in the future discussions about downtown redevelopment because, in Citygov’s opinion, a strong downtown is good for the neighborhoods!

Really? Especially since the neighborhoods have gotten used to the fact that there hasn’t been a thriving downtown in over a generation? And wouldn’t a major focus on downtown’s redevelopment detract from the concern over already troubled neighborhoods, where the majority of people are poor, elderly or people of color and are victims of Rochester’s infamously high crime rate?

Oddly enough, plans for redeveloping downtown Rochester have been going on for a very long time. All have ultimately met with failure.

The creation of Midtown Mall was the ultimate expression of reinventing downtown. Opening its doors in the early 1960′s, it is now a hole upon which Citygov hopes to build its Potemkin Village.

The historic RKO Palace, torn down in 1965. An earlier attempt to "reinvent" downtown, it still remains a parking lot!

Yet, when Midtown was going up, the old RKO Palace movie theatre was coming down. The RKO Palace was located on the northwest corner of North Clinton Avenue and Mortimer Street. A true Rochester landmark, hearkening back to the days of vaudeville, it was appointed with carved and gilded wood staircases, crystal chandeliers and balconies. It was representative of a more gracious time when Rochester was rich and downtown was the destination! The RKO Palace was torn down in 1965 to make way for “The Towers” project, which was to consist of shops, restaurants, office space and apartments. It has remained a parking lot all these years, another example of “downtown redevelopment!”

As for the grandiose “Renaissance Square” project, well, all that will remain of that badly bungled plan will be the above-ground “Mortimer Street Bus Barn,” which nobody other than Citygov wants.

That is the problem with reinventing downtown. Private developers wouldn’t touch it unless we gave it away, like Citygov did with the Sibley Building to the Wynn company, and even then there are no guarantees that such developers will actually keep their word, since there is really nothing in writing that will protect the taxpayers of Rochester from yet another costly disaster. This is coming at a time when the annual budget is coming up, when there will undoubtedly be hints at cuts in necessary city services. Our tax base is eroding, we get less state aid than do Buffalo or Syracuse, and having a former mayor of Rochester as lieutenant governor hasn’t brought us any real benefit…just like when he was in office here!

The case for reviving downtown is like Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein.

Dr. Frankenstein created a monster by stitching together parts of corpses and imbuing it with a sort of life. The good doctor could not control his creature, who runs rampant and who ultimately destroys him.

It is the same with downtown redevelopment.

A thriving downtown has been dead for a very long time. Seeking to revive it, when legitimate investors won’t, as an elitist enclave to the detriment of Rochester’s already struggling neighborhoods, merely makes we average Rochesterians victims of the monster.

And remember, while the monster killed other people, he never killed Dr. Frankenstein!

Citygov knows this, too! The only ones who will suffer from the curse will be us!

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Rich Gardner has been writing about the history, culture and waterways of Upstate New York for years. His articles have appeared in U.S. and Canadian publications, and one book, Learning to Walk. He is an alumnus of Brighton High School and SUNY Geneseo. He operates Upstate Resume & Writing Service in Brighton and recently moved to Corn Hill, where he is already involved in community projects. "I enjoy the 'Aha!' moments of learning new things, conceptual and literal. City living is a great teacher."

Ken Warner grew up in Brockport and first experienced Rochester as a messenger boy for a law firm in Midtown Tower. He recently moved downtown into a loft on the 13th floor of the Temple Building with a view of the Liberty Poll and works in the Powers Building overlooking Rochester’s four corners as Executive Director for UNICON, an organization devoted to bringing economic development to the community. He hopes to use his Rochester Blog to share his observations from these unique views of downtown.